This report describes a process of development in which managers move beyond addressing shortcomings and are encouraged to recognize and internalize their strengths. The document begins with the idea that the failure to recognize one's strengths is at the root of many performance problems. It describes the difficulty in getting managers to recognize their attributes, and it offers some of the benefits to be gained from helping managers internalize these attributes. The text is divided into four sections. The first part focuses on how the failure to recognize strengths affects executive performance, such as when executives respond to a perceived lack of talent by trying too hard. The next section explores why talking to executives about their strengths can be difficult and their discomfiture with praise due to an aversion to arrogance and complacency, and how the pressure they feel to keep up the good work. The report shows how energy is freed up when a manager's strengths are internalized, and it outlines five principles for helping executives use strengths for development: (1) do not let them take the strengths for granted; (2) engage them in potent self-reflection; (3) concentrate the messages and distill the data; (4) get personally involved; and (5) stay involved. (RJM)